A guest from the Joshua Tree National Park Association will speak at the Sierra Club San Gorgonio chapter’s next monthly meeting.

Karina White will present “Experience Wild Joshua Tree National Park,” at the meeting, which is at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the San Bernardino County Museum, 2024 Orange Tree Lane, Redlands.

The San Gorgonio chapter of the Sierra Club covers the geographic area of San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

White is the director of the Desert Institute, the adult education division of the Joshua Tree National Park Association. In her illustrated talk, White will pay particular attention to the Desert Institute’s open-enrollment field courses, community lectures and custom designed programming.

The institute’s courses cover Joshua Tree’s cultural history and natural science. Courses in survival skills and the arts also are offered. The Desert Institute offers more than 100 programs a year. Several are classes available for university credit through the UC Riverside Extension services.

The association was founded in 1962 as a nonprofit cooperating partner with Joshua Tree National Monument, as it was then known. The association’s mission is to assist with preservation, education, historical and scientific programs for the benefit of the park and its visitors. Programs and projects and personnel that cannot be achieved through federal funding are made possible through Joshua Tree National Park Association.

The association manages four park visitor center bookstores, an online bookstore, the Desert Institute and numerous grant programs. It is the fundraising partner for Joshua Tree National Park.

Over the past year, the association has given fundamental aid to the park. With the help of members and friends, it has hired additional visitor service specialists to provide information at the visitor centers; helped fund education materials and programs about the park for more than 22,000 local students; funded the Joshua Tree Visitor Center, the most-used entrance point to the park; and distributed grants for research on natural science. Its outreach touches virtually every visitor to the park.

The Joshua Tree National Park Association’s fundraising program is the Legacy Project. The association raises funds and other forms of assistance for the benefit of the park through this program. The park superintendent will choose projects for funding on a yearly basis. These could include education, science, research and outreach programs; the preservation and enhancement of public resources, and; the acquisition of lands and other property essential to park purposes as provided by law.